Mediation ordered in civil suits against former Sulligent High coach

OXFORD, Miss. | Federal judges have ordered mediation in two civil lawsuits alleging that a former Sulligent High School football coach molested boys in Mississippi.

The Associated Press

OXFORD, Miss. | Federal judges have ordered mediation in two civil lawsuits alleging that a former Sulligent High School football coach molested boys in Mississippi. The two alleged victims who filed the lawsuits in U.S. District Court in Oxford are now adults. They say Dwight Bowling molested them while they were students at Smithville High School in Mississippi. The defendants include Bowling and the Monroe County, Miss., School District. Bowling coached for 28 years at Smithville before retiring and coaching at Sulligent High. The molestation alleged in the lawsuits is said to have happened between 2004 and 2010. Bowling, 58, pleaded guilty in 2011 to numerous state and federal charges related to sex acts with boys. He was sentenced in federal court to 25 years. In state court, he was sentenced to 35 years. Bowling is in a federal prison in Virginia. Bowling was coaching for Sulligent when he was arrested in September in Mississippi on his way home from a football game. Authorities said a 13-year-old boy who was with Bowling at the time of his arrest accused him of improper touching.